5 year old on ABC's and Numbers

Stephanie - posted on 10/14/2012

my child is almost five and he acts the same way he really want siit down long enough to learn anything really ive tried i dnt know how many times and he still wont listen i would like to know some answer i wish i could help you out but i need help on mine to help us someone plz

Sarh - posted on 10/12/2010

I never had this problem as my little girl for some reason loves homework (she is in K-4). I keep saying yea, she loves homework for now. lol. But! Her teacher sends home little class room "Newsletters" that have questions for us parents to ask our children about school and what not. And Week 2's newsletter she had wrote "Go for a walk through your neighborhood -Talk about all the different things you see. Look for the letters S s around the neighborhood or on boxes and cans in your kitchen." So maybe if you and your son (or the whole family if it wouldn't be too distracting) could take a walk around your neighborhood and point out letters and numbers you see on signs (whether it is a sign in someones yard or a street sign, etc), addresses on houses, license plates, etc. Also on this newsletter there is a section titled "Home Activities" and they must be focusing on S s in school, but you could do this w/any and all letters and or numbers. But it says, "Page through newspaper or magazine headlines with your child, looking for capital S and small s. Circle the letters that you find. Look at the materials again and ask your child to point to each circled letter and say its name. There is another sections called "Sort Objects" which states, "Have your child sort objects in your home by size, shape, or color. Then have him/her count how many objects are in each set."
With the "Home Activities" you could focus on one letter for a couple days to a week until you think he can point it out on his own and then move onto another letter. Same thing w/numbers. Also, read to him every day! I read to my daughter right before bedtime. If you read to him before bedtime then while reading point to a letter and ask him what it is.
Hope something here helps!! :)

Adrienne - posted on 10/11/2010

Hi Kayla,
My oldest is 3 years old. He knows have to sing the ABC's and count up to 10 but doesn't know them if you point them out and ask what they are. My son is also very active but can't stay focused for more then a minute. We had him to to a speech therapist because he wasn't talking right but I did learn a way to help keep my son's attention for a minute to learn some words, abc's, numbers, what she did was have two different games. One was a pirate in a barrel and you stick the swords in one by one and one sword would eventually pop the pirate out, the other game was like candy land shapes you get 5 ginger bread men and you pull the candy cane on the castle and a shape would pop out and the kid would have to put the shape in it's place on one of the ginger bread men. Anyway what the lady did was get my son to say a word, abc, or number then depending on the game he would get a sword or a shape and he would want more so he would have to say another word, abc, number and keep going on like that for half an hour. Which to me was amazing because I can't get him to sit with me for 5 minutes to learn anything. I'm looking to find those two games so then I can do it at home. My son is in Children's First because the speech therapist, his swimming teacher, and I believe my son has either add or adhd. But when it comes to my 2 year old he knows his abc's and can point them out and his numbers and words and will stay focus to do things. Good Luck!

Liz - posted on 10/09/2010

My two year old b/g twins are the same way. Though with some help they can count to ten and say their ABCs. I try to make things into a game for them. I've found that making it into a game will have them sit longer than normally.

Medic - posted on 10/09/2010

My son learned them at 3 in prek......he likes to play with cards and put the cards in order though.

Catherine - posted on 10/09/2010

I have a 5yr old boy as well...and getting his attention to learn is so hard! Almost to the point of fustration. He has been to school since the age of 3 and is still very shy. He knows all his ABC's and numbers but pretends to not know anything when he is asked about them in school. I hvae found that he likes to use chalk, so we have got a chalk baord from toys r us for him to help with his learning. He also uses an Ipad at school that has learning games on it. He loves it! I think for boys they tend to like electronic learning toys. We got him the tag reading pen. He likes that, doesnt really catch his attention for 2 long but is a good learning tool.

Good Day! - posted on 10/09/2010

Make learning active! Get a bunch of contruction paper and write each letter on a different piece of paper. Spread them out on the ground. Call out a letter and get your son to "hop to it!" Then call out another one and let him jump from where he is, to the next one. You can do the same thing with sidewalk chalk.



Or make a relay race. Put the letters or numbers on one side of the yard. Tell him to get B, G and Y. Time him as he runs to get them and bring them back to you. Repeat until he's tired!



Again with the construction paper letters and numbers, lay them on the ground. Give him a ball or beanbag or rolled up socks. Have him toss the ball to the letter you call out.



With the numbers, hold up a number. Have him do that many jumping jacks or claps or whatever, kind of like Simon Says.



Learning does not have to happen while seated and quiet. If you have an active kid, make learning active!

Alana - posted on 10/09/2010

i have exactly the same problem! my son is nearly five and he wont sit still for two minutes. i have devised a star chart so he gets a star every time he does his spellings and reads his book but its still hard work n takes a lot of encouragement to keep him at it! we have the fridge covered in letters and numbers magnets, and have got a wite board on it. we encourage him to find the words/letters/numbers and then write them oon the whiteboard.
in his bedroom he has number charts and letter charts on the wall and we look at them every few days but they are always there for him to see. when we sing the alphabet we point to each letter, he has been able to song his abc since he was 2 but he has only just got the grasp of ALL the letters to look at.
we also sing lots of number songs (1,2,3,4,5...once i caught a fish alive..etc) and count the numbers with our fingers.
you can involve numbers in alsorts of everyday tasks get him to help you with money. count how many toy cars he has, play booard games with a die that has numbers on instead of dots, and so on.
Hope i helped you, and dont worry he will get in in the end i have heard boys can be a bit like that..they have a short attention span xx